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HIS LAST BATTLE, 

AND 

(Bm of W Greatest Fictones ; 

BEING THE SPEECH OF 

WENDELL PHILLIPS 

IJV FANEUIL HALL, 
ON THE LOUISIANA DIFFICULTIES, 

January 15, 1S75, 

COMPILED FROM VARIOUS REPORTS, WITH A HISTORICAL 

INTRODUCTION AND NOTES, A DISCUSSION OF THE 

QUESTIONS INVOLVED, AND A CRITICAL 

ESTIMATE OF THE SPEECH, ETC. 



BY 

JESSE H. JONES, 

IJrrsiticnt of tijc amcnticll itiljillips faemovtal ^ssactatton. 



BOSTON: .:^' -"^''■^'^^. 
PUBLISHED BY THE ASSOCIATION. 
159 Beach Street. ^^\S^^ -^ J 



Copyright, 1896, 
By Jesse H. Jones. 



Kntijcrsitg ^rcss: 
John Wilson and Son, Cambridge, U.S.A. 






PEEFACE. 



SOME years ago a neighbor of mine, J. P. Charnberlin, 
M. D., described to nie the speech of Wendell 
Phillips, which is the subject of this monograph, as he 
had heard it, speaking of it in the strongest terms of 
admiration. I was so much interested in his account that 
afterwards we went to Faneuil Hall together, and he 
showed me where he had stood, a little in front of the 
middle of the hall, and where Mr. Phillips sat, up in the 
northwest corner of the gallery. 

Afterward, another neighbor, George W. Kelley, now 
judge of our district court, told me of the same speech, 
not knowing wliat I had heard before, and spoke of it in 
similar terms. He had something to do with the shoutino; 
by which Mr. Phillips was called out. But neither could 
locate the time, or tell anything that would enable an- 
other to do so, except that the meeting was concerning 
Louisiana and Sheridan. After a year or two the judge 
tound a copy of the speech among his papers, and sent it 
to me. It was a tract without date, evidently edited by 
Mr. Phillij)s. From its contents I learned that Gaston 
was goveruor, and so by searching the files of a Boston 
daily I was able to locate the event. 

At once I was filled with the desire to make as com- 
plete a record as possible of the part Mr. Phillips had in 



11 PREFACE. 

the affair, so that whoever might read should see it living 
again before his imagination. To this end I determined 
to collate all the principal records I could find, glean every 
several item of the events, and, so far as I could discern, 
arrange them all together as they occurred, so that all that 
Mr. Phillips said, just as he said it, and all the demonstra- 
tions of the crowd, — everything which the reports of the 
Boston press furnished, should be gathered into one record 
that would be practically complete. This I have done, 
and now present the result. 

The first comparison showed that Mr. Phillips had taken 
the " Journal " report, with slight variations, and made 
some additions more fully expressing his thought than he 
liad been able to do under the harrying of the treatment 
he received at the time, and in one instance had added 
much new matter. All the additions remain, and are 
designated by being enclosed in brackets with a star. 

The next comparison showed that the " Post " had en- 
deavored to give a complete verbatim report of almost 
the whole proceedings; and that in its account of what 
Mr. Phillips said, there was important matter which 
did not appear in the tract. On further comparison, the 
" Advertiser " also was found to furnish valuable material. 
By the careful collation of these three reports with the 
edited copy, and the piecing in of all the various frag- 
ments, it was possible to make a comparatively complete 
and correct account of the whole event so far as Mr. 
Phillips was concerned. Afterwards I came upon the 
verbatim report in the " Transcript," printed under cir- 
cumstances which prove the great interest his utterance 
had awakened ; and what I had in hand was carefully 
collated with that. Thus, out of five accounts, I gathered 



PREFACE. iil 

everything that seemed to go toward making accuracy 
and completeness in the record. 

Then I submitted this record, and all I had done be- 
sides, to my two neighbors who were present, and from 
them important information was received ; and the whole 
material as it stands has received their sanction. After- 
wards the manuscript was placed in the hands of the 
Garrisons and Hallowells, who were closest personal 
friends of Mr. Phillips, and the two following letters are 
the result : — 

BosTOx, October 2G, 1896. 

My dear Mr. Jones, — I return your MS. herewith. By 
all means print and puhlish it. Your estimate of the value of 
Mr. Phillips' speech is fully justified by both matter and manner ; 
and as one of his friends I shall rejoice to see it added to the 
list of his published public utterances. 

Thanking you for allowing me the pleasure of reading the 
pamphlet in advance of publication, and assuring you of my 
sincere hope that it is destined to have a wide circulation, I 
remaiu 

Yours very trul}'^, 

Richard P. Hallowell. 



Boston, November 28, 1896. 

My dear Mr. Jones, — I was present at the Faneuil Hall 
meeting which you have so laboriously and conscientiously 
reproduced in form and spirit from the incomplete reports of 
the day. The feeling of the occasion was intense, the repressed 
excitement of the audience finding full vent when Wendell 
Phillips was at length summoned to the platform and gave voice 
to the opposition felt against the purpose of tlie managers. 
Mr. Phillips, surcharged with ammunition gathered from the 
preceding speeches, from being himself at bay, soon reversed 
the position and put the meeting upon the defensive. The 



IV PREFACE. 

chagrin of the majority of the audience, which had come to 
censure the President and General Sheridan, found expression 
in frequent interruption and derisive comments from the floor ; 
but tlie speaker's keen retorts developed a strong force of 
sympathizers and counteracting applause. 

You have faithfully represented the dignified courtesy and 
gentlemanly bearing of the chairman, the Hon. William Gray, 
who, in a trying position, with the unexpected criticism and 
eloquent arraignment of the meeting's callers, preserved a firm- 
ness and fairness that extorted alike the admiration of friend 
and opponent. 

Although the cut and dried resolutions were carried at the 
close of Mr. Phillips' speech, it was generally felt that the 
meeting failed of its purpose. The back of the protest was 
broken. This was the last great effort of the orator of the anti- 
slavery movement in Faneuil Hall, and therefore memorable. 
As you suggest, it was a reminder of that first historic speech, 
when the young lawyer bearded the Attorney-General of the 
Commonwealth. 

You have performed a service by your skilful reproduction of 
the scene from scattered materials. I have read it with aroused 
recollection and in critical mood, failing to detect a false note in 
your judicial statement of the facts. Richard Olney's speech at 
this meeting, defining his views on Federal interference with 
State concerns, is especially interesting, in contrast with his 
action as Secretary of State, during the late Chicago riots. 

Hoping that your pamphlet will have a large sale, I am very 
sincerely yours, 

William Lloyd Garrison. 

With these indorsements the work is offered to the 
consideration of that multitude of people in the laud who 
love and honor the great champion of human freedom for 
all mankind. — J. 



INTRODUCTION. 



DUEING the month of January, 1875, a considerable 
portion of the people of the North became aflame 
with indignation at the course pursued by the Federal 
government in the city of New Orleans with reference to 
the legislature of Louisiana. On the fourth day of that 
month, when the legislature met, the attempt to organize 
the lower House was attended by acts of violence, which 
resulted in the coming of United States troops into the 
Assembly room, and their arresting and taking away five 
men who claimed to be members. This act put a part of 
the North into a fever of excitement, they believing and 
claiming that the military authorities of the United States 
had interfered unlawfully in the civil affairs of a State, 
and dictated the formation of the legislature, thus violat- 
ing one of the fundamental principles of the Constitution, 
and putting in peril our whole system of government. 
Public meetings to express the indignation thus aroused 
were held, especially in St. Louis, New York, and Boston. 
Our concern is with tlie meeting in the latter city. 

Soon after the events in Louisiana were known, a peti- 
tion was put in circulation in Boston for the use of Faneuil 
Hall, "the Cradle of Liberty," for a public meeting in 
which to express the feelings of the citizens of Boston 
who condemned tlie course of the government. The peti- 
tion was granted; and the meeting was called for noon on 
Friday, the fifteenth of the month. 



2 INTRODUCTION. 

"The day was cold, and the hall so cliilly that none 
could be comfortable without an overcoat. ... At noon 
the hall was comfortably filled, and upon the call to 
order, ten minutes later, there was no standing room left," 
— the house was packed to the doors, the floor with men 
standing solid together, and the galleries with people 
seated and standing. 

Among those present was Wendell Phillips, who sat in 
the extreme northwestern corner of the gallery on the left 
of the speakers, behind the close board partition which 
surrounds the stairway by which on that side one can 
descend from the gallery down upon the speaker's plat- 
form. He was " in full view of and facing the audience," 
and when he was discovered and called for, he at once 
became as " conspicuous " as any person in the hall. 

On the platform, besides the speakers, the " Post " men- 
tioned the Hons. William Aspinwall, Edward Gray, and 
Martin Brimmer, E. B. Haskell, Esq., President Eliot of 
Harvard College, Henry D. Crowell, Esq., Eobert H. Gard- 
ner of Maine, William Perkins, Esq., William Endicott, Jr., 
Esq., Franklin Haven, Esq., and Samuel F. Haven, Esq. 

" The meeting was called to order by J. Lewis Stackpole, 
Esq., assistant city solicitor " of Boston, who presented the 
following list of officers, " which was adopted unani- 
mously : the names of Mr. Gray and Governor Gaston be- 
ing received with great applause." 

LIST OF OFFICEES. 

President. 
William Gray. 

Vice-Presidents. 

His Excellency Wm. Gaston, Rev. James F. Clarke, 

Hon. Alex. H. Bullock, Col. C. R. Codman, 

Hon. Chas. Francis Adams, Hon. Willard P. Phillips, 

Chas. W. Eliot, Pres. H. U. Col. Theodore Lyman, 



INTRODUCTION. 6 

Vice-Presidents. 

Hon. Charles Allen, John L. Gardner, 

Dk. Estks Howe, Franklin Haven, 

George R. Minot, William Perkins, 

W.\i. E. Perkins, William Endicott, Jr., 

Gen. a. p. Rockwell, Geo. 0. Shattuck, 

William Aspinwall, Hon. Francis W. Bird, 

W. W. Gheenough, Francis Parkman, 

Martin Brimmer, Henry J. Crowell, 

Henry W. Paine, Albert Mason, 

Leverett Saltonstall, John T. Clark, 
Hon. Richard Frothingham, Henry 0. Hyde, 

E. W. Gurney, Col. Wm. W. Swan. 

"The names of Gaston, Bullock, Adams, Cobb, Clarke, 
Saltonstall, and Bird were greeted with cheers." 

Sccreta7-ies. 
Moorfield Storey, John T. Morse, Jr., 

George P. King, John J. French. 

On taking the chair Mr. Gray made an address, the pur- 
port of which fully appears in the opening and closing 
paragraphs as follows : — 

"Fellow-Citizens: — In the opening month of the centen- 
nial year in which we are to celebrate the battles of Lexington 
and Bunker Hill, the culmination of those long civil struggles 
which preceded American Independence, we are called upon to 
take notice of a fact which has no parallel in American history. 
We must seek under the arbitrary tyranny of the Stuarts of 
England, or under the iron despotism of Oliver Cromwell, 
the Protector, for anything to place by the side of that outrage 
committed in Louisiana on tlie fourth day of January, 1875. 
It gives me great pleasure, fellow-citizens, to stand in your 
presence in this hall on an occasion like tliis. Xo party ties 
are to fetter the speech of any one who addresses you to-day. 
(Applause.) No party fealty can put a check upon tlie free 
speech of the citizens of ^Massachusetts in Faneuil Hall. 
(Applause.) I am the more glad, fellow-citizens, that this meet- 



4 INTRODUCTION. 

ing lias assembled, when I remember that we have two Senators 
in Congress whose voices have not been heard (applause) 
upon this enormous outrage, and when I remember that the two 
leading candidates for the chair of Charles Sumner are now 
members of the House of Representatives at Washington, and 
that their voices have been silent. (Applause.) We have been 
educated in Massachusetts, fellow-citizens, and I trust and feel 
confident tbat, witiiout the aid and countenance of those to 
whom we naturally have looked as our leaders, we will try to 
find our own way to the declaration and maintenance of the 
right. (Applause.)" 

"Fellow-Citizens, — I recall almost with a shudder the 
feelings which I had, and which you all must liave had, when 
the despatch from Lieut. General Sheridan received from the 
Secretary of War that response, ' The President and all the rest 
of us approve your conduct.' I say I shuddered when I read 
that despatch, for had the people of Louisiana been less calm in 
their action, a spark might have set on fire a conflagration which 
years might not have extinguished. The power of the Govern- 
ment under these circumstances should be entrusted to cool 
heads and warm hearts. (Applause.) It is not enough that a 
person [i. e. Sheridan] does not intend to do wrong. If he 
occupies a high official position he is bound to do right. (Ap- 
plause.) If he is too ignorant or too incompetent to know what 
the right is, then the responsibility of his continuing in place 
rests somewhere else." 

" The last sentence of Mr. Gray was received with loud 
applause and continued cheering, which was followed by 
tliree cheers for General Sheridan ; and above all could be 
heard some one shoutintj, ' All honor to his name ! ' " and 
to that shout every soldier voice and heart of the North 
will ever respond with all its strength, while there is a 
voice to shout or a heart to beat. 

" The speaker called the audience to order, and intro- 
duced Col. Henry Lee, who," after reading a warmly sym- 



INTRODUCTION. 5 

pathetic telegram from ex-Governor Bullock, presented the 
following — 

EESOLUTIONS. 

We, citizens of Boston, assembled iu Faneuil Hall, hereby 
resolve, — 

1. That we have heard with deep indignation, that five per- 
sons, occupying seats in the Legislature of Louisiana, were 
forcibly removed from the Hall of the House of Kepresentatives 
on the 4th day of January, 1875, by the military forces of the 
United States. 

2. That the conduct of these forces in such action was in 
violation of tlie rights of the people of Louisiana, and destruc- 
tive of civil liberty. 

3. That in the approval by the Secretary of War of the 
despatches of Lieut. General Sheridan we find an ignorance of 
correct principles which should disqualify him from holding 
his important office : and in his assumption to speak for the 
President and all the Cabinet, he committed a grievous wrong 
to those of his associates who had given no assent to such 
approval ; and we appeal to them to repel the aspersion by 
their official action. 

4. That the example transmitted to us by the founders of our 
Republic, to preserve the separate independence of the executive, 
legislative, and judicial departments in their respective spheres 
shall be transmitted by us to our children, and the military arm 
shall be kept subordinate to the civil power, to the end that the 
sword may be the supporter, and not the destroyer of civil 
liberty. 

5. That the spirit which formed the confederacy of the 
colonies before the American Eevolution, by which the interest 
and power of each and all were united, should load the United 
States of America in their several State organizations, and by 
their citizens in public meeting assembled, to take care that no 
vital principle affecting the integrity and permanency of repub- 
lican government shall be successfully assailed or undermined. 

6. That ancient and modern history unite in declaring " that 



6 INTRODUCTION. 

illegal violence, with whatever pretence it may be covered, 
and whatever it may pnrsue, must inevitably end at last in 
the arbitrary and des[)otic government of a single person." 

7. That we tender onr sincere sympathy to the people of 
Louisiana, ami appeal to them to continue the forbearance 
which tliey have shown under these trying circumstances, and 
assure them that we will do all that in us lies to secure to each 
and every State in the Union, and to all the people, the main- 
tenance of their just and inalienable rights. 

8. That we fondly anticipate, with a better understanding 
between all parts of the country, the disappearance of sectional 
strife, being assured that the people of the country have cor- 
dially accepted the amendments to the Constitution, and intend 
to protect and maintain the civil and political rights which they 
guarantee to all. 

9. That we hail with gratitude and delight the fact that we 
are all under one Government and one flag, and we look forward 
with confidence to the prosperity, peace, and happiness which 
belong to a free people, who make and administer their own 
laws. 

How the resolutions were received is shown by the fol- 
lowing coniinents of the reporters. 

The " Post " said, " The resolutions met with general 
approval, and several of them were warmly applauded." 

Tlie "Journal" said, "The reading of the second resolu- 
tion was received with a medley of clieers and hisses." 

Of the addresses, except tliat of Mr. Phillips, passages 
are given which seem to be representative, though they 
are brief. 

After the reading of the resolutions, the chairman intro- 
duced Gen. S. M. Quincy, of Boston, as the first speaker 
under them. General Quincy was chiefly occupied in de- 
fending or excusing General Sheridan, under whom he 
had served in New Orleans, and in laying the responsi- 
bility on the authorities at Washington ; but he bore 



INTRODUCTION. 7 

strong testimony to the violence and bloodshed in the 
Ibrmer city, and in Louisiana, in the following words: — 

" It lias been luy fortune since the close of the war to lead a 
column of Federal bayonets against the New Orleans mob and po- 
lice, banded together in a work of assassination and massacre. , . . 
1 have also been sent by General Sheridan more than once far 
into the interior of the State, to investigate murder and outrage, 
such as are now reported ; ami I, for one, cannot doubt that the 
smouldering embers, which were then breaking out here and 
there in violence and blood, are still alive (applause), — and 
that the closing words of one of General Grant's recent despatches 
are fearfully true, namely, that human life has been for some 
time past terribly cheap in Louisiana." 

The next speaker was Mr. John Quincy Adams, of 
Quiucy. The pith of his extended address is in the fol- 
lowing sayings : — 

"As soon, therefore, as the House met, having secured a legal 
quorum, they proceeded without delay to organize by the elec- 
tion of a Conservative Speaker ; and a Committee on Elections 
having been appointed, at once reported upon the right of the 
five conservatives, who had not received certificates of election 
from the Returning Board, to seats in the House. The report 
of the Committee was accepted, and the five members were duly 
sworn in and took their seats," 

" Even if the prevailing faction pressed to the very edge of 
the law, yet they respected the law." 

"Why is it not true, that, effected as that manoeuvre Avas, 
legally to be sure, but by sharp practice and surprise, its ulti- 
mate effect would have been to injure the Conservative cause 
itself] " 

" What right liad soldiers of the United States to determine 
Avho should sit in the Legislature of a State 1 " 

"When Mr. Adams had finished there were " loud calls 
for ' Phillips.' " The chairman disregarded them, however. 



8 INTRODUCTION. 

and introduced Hon. F. W. Bird, of Walpole, who spoke 
briefly in a feeble voice, but with a wildness of rhetoric 
that tries the sei'iousness of the reader. When he finished, 
" the friends of Mr. Phillips shouted his name." There- 
upon " Mr. Gray said arrangements had been made for 
certain speakers, and that, if the audience would be patient, 
after they had finished, any one else might take the hall and 
carry on speaking till nightfall if they pleased." He then 
introduced Hon. Leverett Saltonstall, of Salem, who, in 
the course of his address, spoke as follows : — 

''But when the legislature, which those long sutferiiig people 
who had gone to the polls and had succeeded in obtaining by 
this Conservative majority of twenty-odd thousand votes, had 
assembled, these troops were marclied into the Assembly and 
seized five men who had been sent there by their constituents 
to represent them in the Assembly of Louisiana. When they 
did this it was as gross an usurpation by a military power upon 
a free people as the history of this country, or as the history of 
the world, presents." 

Next came Hon. Albert Mason, of Plymouth, who in 
part said, for substance : — 

" There was no pretence that the Assembly was not a legal 
body. General l)e Trobriand was requested simply to remove 
the members not returned by the Returning Board, and simply 
to judge of tlieir qualifications ; a right whicli the Assembly 
alone possessed. If this is done in one State it will be done in 
another. If this act is passed in silence there will be no safety 
for republican institutions." 

Mr. Mason was followed by Eichard Olney, Esq., the 
pith of wliose thought was expressed in the following 
quotations : — 

''Certainly the Federal troops in New Orleans on January 
fourth were not used to quell any insurrection. There had been 



INTRODUCTION. 9 

none tliere since September. ... It is just as certain tliat they 
were not there upon any call of the State of Louisiana. Its 
Legislature made no such call, and being convened, its executive 
could not make it. This, then, being the state of things, . . . 
when its Legislature convenes its members approached the place 
of meeting through files of Federal soldiers. The State house 
was surrounded by them. . . . 

" Apparently it (the Administration) meant to assert that the 
President might enter a State with troops to suppress disorder 
and violence at his own discretion, upon his own view of the 
exigency, and without waiting for tlie consent or request of the 
State itself. No more glaring attempt at usurpation can be 
imagined. If successful, it would revolutionize our whole gov- 
ernmental system, . . . and clearly annihilate the right of local 
self-government by a State." 

After Mr. Oluey, Mr. Eobert M. Morse, Jr., spoke 
briefly, closing with these words : — 

" I would ask, Mr. Chairman, that this meeting send forth as 
the empliatic voice of Boston and Massachusetts to the Presi- 
dent of tlie United States : Sir, your subordinates have forcibly 
ejected five members from the Legislature of Louisiana, and 
thereby deprived the people of that State of the right to be 
governed by their own representatives. Permit these five 
members to resume their seats in the Legislature of Louisiana." 



THE SPEECH OF MR. PHILLIPS. 

""I ^HE moment Mr. Morse uttered his last sentence there 
J- were renewed cries for Wendell Phillips," while the 
President came to the desk and said : " The question is on 
the adoption of the resolutions." But the loud outcries of 
"Phillips!" "Phillips!" "Phillips!" continuing, that gentle- 
man rose from his seat and removed his hat, as if about to 
speak ; whereupon " the hall was filled with deafening 
cheers and a general uproar." For what seemed "a long 
time " the conflicting cries of " Phillips ! " " Phillips ! " and 
" Question !" " Question!" contended for the mastery, " until 
the" President of tlie meeting interfered to restore order." 
" It was some moments before he could secure the atten- 
tion of the audience, but when be did so he said :" — 

Fellow-Citizens, — We are assembled in Faneuil Hall 
to discuss great public questions. The meeting is open to 
any citizen who wishes to give us his advice. (Cries of 
" Good ! ") Whoever chooses to speak shall be heard, if the 
chairman has the confidence of the meeting. 

" After these remarks, Mr. Phillips, in his place in the 
gallery, said : ' Mr. Chairman,' and was about to continue, 
when there were loud cries of ' Platform ! ' Mr. Phillips 
hesitated, but the Chairman having beckoned to him," he 
came slowly down the stairway in the midst of " tremen- 
dous applause and every expression of enthusiasm," carry- 
ing his hat in bis right hand half raised, seemingly musing 
as he came on what he should say. " As he stepped up 
upon the platform three cheers were given liim, and there 
were some hisses." Threading his way through those 



12 THE SPEECH OF MR. PHILLIPS. 

seated there, he came around to the open space on the 
right of the President of the meeting, and taking his stand 
by the desk he surveyed the sea of upturned faces before 
him, more hostile than friendl}^, and regarding them for an 
instant he said : — 

Mr. Chairman and Fellow-Citizens, — I came here 
this morning because I saw in the journals that the voice 
of Boston was to be uttered through Faneuil Hall on 
topics of great national interest. The citizens of Boston 
were summoned to record their verdict, mark you, on the 
conduct of the Executive of the United States. I looked 
over the list of gentlemen who summoned to Faneuil Hall 
the people of Boston, and I said, " If this be the voice of 
Boston, who are the Boston men that summon us to this 
expression of Boston's opinion ? Are they the men that 
vote and pay taxes here, and bear the shame or the glory 
of being citizens of Boston, that summoned this meeting ? " 

The first name on the list is that of Charles Fi'ancis 
Adams, of Quincy. (Hisses and cheers.) A very worthy — 

"Here Mr. Phillips was interrupted by a storm of 
hisses which lasted for several seconds. Finally he ven- 
tured to go on and said : " — 

A very worthy gentleman, but he votes and pays taxes 
in Quincy. (Great confusion here prevailed.) Well, gen- 
tlemen, if you will only hear me, you will see that I mean 
no disrespect to Mr. Adams, or to any other signer. (Cries 
of " You can't ! " and " Hear him ! ") I say that Mr. Adams 
— allow me to speak — that Mr. Adams is a worthy gen- 
tleman. (Applause and confusion.) If you will only hear 
me, gentlemen, we will save time. (Cries of " Question ! " 
&c.) I have no intention — 

" Here the noise was so great that Mr. Phillips could not 
be heard, and he was obliged to pause. The President 
arose to restore order and stepped upon the platform and 
called loudly for order. So great, however, was the noise — 



THE SPEECH OF MR. PHILLIPS. 13 

the words ' Question ! ' ' Go ou ! ' ' Hear him ! ' ' Free speech 
in Fancuil Hall! ' ' Let hira talk !' &c., being shouted on all 
sides — that for some time the President could say nothing. 
At length the noise subsided to a certain extent, and the 
President said : " — 

" Fellow-citizens, hear Mr. Phillips, hear anybody and 
everybody who wishes to speak in Faneuil Hall. Be 
patient and give them your ears, and finally vote accord- 
ing to your own judgment." The words were received 
with great applause, and Mr. Phillips continued. He 
said : — 

I observed on this list, gentlemen, the names of worthy 
citizens from Salem, and Plymouth, and Quincy, and Wor- 
cester, and Cambridge. But, gentlemen, I called up to 
my memory the one hundred men — lawyers, merchants, 
clergymen, and editors — who, on any other occasion [*in 
the judgment of the world] would be understood to repre- 
sent the city of Boston (applause), and I affirm, fellow- 
citizens, that if you presented that paper to one hundred 
of them, ninety would refuse to sign it, (Applause and 
hisses, and cries of " Get out ! " " No ! no ! " &c.) Their 
names are not on this Call. (Cries of " Right ! " and a voice, 
"That's a lie !") No, I deny it. (Confusion, and cries of 
" Order ! ") 

" Here the voice of the speaker became inaudible. He 
waited a moment, and when he could be heard, he 
said : " — 

I have been in Faneuil Hall before. Now, gentlemen, 
all I ask is this — (A voice, "You agree with Grant!") 
All I ask is this : When gentlemen come here to express 
the voice of Boston, and have not the name of a leading 
clergyman, or lawyer, or editor (applause), or merchant, — 

" Here the speaker was interrupted by a tremendous up- 
roar," and there were cries of" Beecher ! " " Infidel I" " Ques- 
tion ! " " Who wrote the letter for Boston ? " " What kind of 



14 THE SPEECH OF MR. PHILLIPS. 

a letter was it ? " " Eead the letter to Belknap ! " ^ while 
hundreds were crying out, " Free speech ! " " Hear him ! " 
and " expressions of disgust and disapproval mingled in a 
deafening chorus." 

Mr. Phillips continued : Fellow-citizens, pray hear ine. 
(A voice, " Three cheers for Phillips the builder ! ") 

Tlie President again took the stand and called loudly 
for order, and said, " Friends, hear me. Brothers and fellow- 
citizens, hear me. I appeal to you as citizens of Boston 
to listen with patience to anything that is to be said. I 
have no reason to suppose that Mr. Phillips will say any- 
thing that will offend your sense of right and justice. (A 
voice, " No, sir ! ") But if he should do so, the power of the 
vote is in your hands (" Yes ! ") — and you can exercise 
it then ; but hear him, I beg you hear him. (Applause and 
cries of " Good ! ") 

Mr. Phillips continued, — The inference, fellow-citizens, 
that I draw from this examination [*the quality of the Call] 
is this : In forming resolutions which are to go forth from 
such a meeting as this, — practically, wliatever may be 
the actual fact, — as the voice largely of Boston, it be- 
comes gentlemen, standing here so alone, to be peculiarly 
careful in the facts they assert, and the inferences they 

1 Letter of WendeU Phillips to Secretary of War Belknap, referred to 
above. 

Boston, Jan. 9. 

Sir : I intrude on your time to thank the administration for the course 
taken in Louisiana. Sheridan's judgment is entirely correct. You must 
have, or easily obtain, abundant evidence to sustain him. I trust the 
President will support him promptly and vigorously. Be sure the North 
will rally around Grant in such circumstances. I wish to express to him 
my gratitude as a citizen for the decision and sagacity in dealing with the 
White League. One firm, decisive blow will scatter the whole conspiracy. 
Left to itself it will keep the South in a turmoil, and land her in bank- 
ruptcy, if not in rebellion. 

Respectfully, 

(Signed) Wexdell Phillips. 



THE SPEECH OF MR. PHILLIPS. 15 

draw. Because, in the absence of Dana and Bigelow, and 
Abbott and Bartlett, and their fellows, the legal profession 
is not here. lu the absence of the merchants of State 
Street, with half a dozen exceptions, the commerce of Bos- 
ton is not here. (A voice, " That is so ! " and hisses.) In 
the absence of every clergyman who votes in this city, the 
pulpit is not here. (A voice, " That is so ! " applause and 
hisses.) Therefore I say (continued hissing), gentlemen, it 
becomes us to exercise extraordinary caution (cries of 
" Free speech ! " in the midst of noisy demonstrations) that 
the facts we state in such a position, and the inferences we 
make are carefully guarded. 

Now, gentlemen — (A voice, " Give us your opinion, 
quick ! ") Please be silent, while I try to make what reply 
I can to the statements of these eloquent gentlemen who 
have preceded me. And you will allow me to say at first, 
by wa}"^ of preface, that the term " citizen of the United 
States " is not mere empty verbiage. It has a meaning, 
and a substantial meaning. To be a citizen of the 
United States is a great privilege. It carries with it inval- 
uable rights, and every man rightfully claiming that name 
as his is entitled to the full protection of the National 
Government. Is he not ? (Voices, " Yes ! " " Yes ! " " That 
is so ! ") Very well. No man doubts that whenever the 
United States citizen in question is in a foreign land — 
When Algiers trampled on a citizen of the United States 
(a voice, " Dr. Howe ! "), Commodore Decatur, with guns 
shotted to the lips, taught the Dey his lesson. Ingraham 
taught Austria the same lesson (a voice, "How about the 
Virginius ? " ), and we have had something to do of that 
kind of work witli Cuba. Well, now, gentlemen, what I 
say is, that tlie citizen of the United States in Massachu- 
setts [* or Louisiana] is as much entitled to the protection 
of the nation as the citizen of the United States in Japan. 
Is he not ? (A voice, " Yes, sir ! " Cries, " That is so ! ") 



16 THE SPEECH OF MR. PHILLIPS. 

Very well. Wlien a negro from the Southern States is 
called [* hauled] from his house and about to be shot ; when 
a white Eepublican, caught in some county of Alabama, is 
about to be assassinated (" That 's a lie ! " " You are right ! " 
mingled applause and hisses), and he looks around on 
the State government about him, and sees no protec- 
tion, — none whatever, for white or black, — has he not a 
right, a full, unquestioned, and emphatic right to call upon 
the National Government at Washington, and say, " Find 
or make a way to protect me, for 1 am a citizen of the 
United States " ? (Tremendous applause, and voices, 
" Yes ! " and " No ! " " No ! " " That is n't the question !" 
" That 's not the point ' ") Very well, gentlemen, I want 
you to bear that text in mind as I go on. (Cries of 
" Question ! " " Question ! ") 

In 1872 the government at Washington recognized the 
government of Governor Kellogg of Louisiana. (Cries of 
"Shame on it !") It is not for you or me to-day to say 
whether it did wisely or not. 

Here Mr. Phillips was greeted with cries of " Yes, it is!" 
which apparently roused his pugnacity ; and while the 
audience was disputing, he took off his overcoat, stepped 
to the end of the platform (he was on the south side), 
laid it across a chair with a very determined air, returned 
to his place beside the desk, folded Ins arms, and stood in 
a defiant attitude which excited considerable laughter. 
He then said : — 

The President of the United States had no alternative. 

" This created a tremendous uproar, hisses, cries, and 
shouts of laughter, and it was nearly a minute before he 
could be heard." When a lull came, he continued : — 

Congress would do nothing ; neither the Senate nor the 
House would act. Your Congress was dumb; it would 
not take a step in any direction. (" That 's so ! ") There 
stood the President of the United States ; what was he to 



THE SPEECH OF MR. PHILLIPS. 17 

do ? (A voice, " Smoke a cigar !" A voice, "Thank God 
we have seut better men this time !") I have just brought 
it to your miud that a citizen ot" the United States has a 
right to look up to him and say, " By yowv oath of office 
protect me." (Cries, "That is so!" A voice, "Yes, he 
never did ! ") Now Congress would do nothing ; but there 
was the State of Louisiana going to pieces. Grant recog- 
nized Kellogg as governor. He must recognize somebody. 

" This last sentence brought down the house, and every- 
body apparently was convulsed with laughter " intermin- 
gled with sneers. " Finally the excitement subsided, and 
Mr. Phillips continued : " — 

If he usurped power, or made a mistake, remember, 
gentlemen, for two long years Congress has never rebuked 
him, never attempted to check his steps. They have tried 
again and again to come to some conclusion on the Louis- 
iana question, but they could not. But there stood the 
executive. He must act. He had no choice ; he had got 
to act. The law must be executed. (A voice, "What 
law ? ") Why, the law of the United States to protect its 
citizens. He did what he was compelled to do. Well, 
then, driven into that position — shut up to it — give him 
your sympathy. (Tremendous applause. Cries of "No!" 
"No!" and prolonged laughter.) [* When the assembled 
wisdom of the nation confessed that it could see no sat- 
isfactory step to take, then have fair consideration for 
the man who was obliged by his oath of office to walk 
forward and meet his responsibilities. At least, when he 
has again and again and again besought Congress to relieve 
him of the burden, don't charge him with intent to usurp 
power.] 

Oh, you know T am not a Grant man. (A voice, " You 
are on the wrong tack ! ") You know I am no partisan, one 
way or the other. (Laughter and cries of " Oh ! " "What 
are you ?") I never threw a vote in my life; never held 

2 



18 THE SPEECH OF MK. PHILLIPS. 

an office, and never expect to. (Cries, " Wasli the blood 
off your hands ! " " How about the constitution ? " ) But 
I tell you that in September last this recognized Governor 
Kellogg, whom Congress would not disavow, and whom 
the President was forced to recognize (a voice, " No ! "), 
— sends to Washington, strictly according to the constitu- 
tion, — "the Legislature not being in session," — and says 
to General Grant : " Domestic violence threatens to sub- 
vert the government." Well now, gentlemen, be patient, 
and look at the question like sensible men. Grant could 
not have acted differently than he did. He could not 
doubt that statement or go behind it, or inquire into its 
truth. Suppose that Governor Gaston should send a mes- 
sage from Massachusetts to Washington to-day, and tell 
the President of a certain condition of affairs here, the 
President could not go back of that ; he could not see any- 
body but Gaston ; he has no right to. (Sneers and 
laughter.) 

You remember the old story in Charles the First's day, 
when the King went into the House of Commons — other 
gentlemen have referred to it — and wanted to see the 
five members, and he said to the Speaker, " Where is So- 
and-so ? " and the Speaker kneeled down and said : " May it 
please your Majesty, I cannot answer the question, because 
I have no right to speak anything that the House does not 
tell me to say." Well, it is exactly so that the President 
is situated with regard to Louisiana or Massachusetts mat- 
ters. If Governor Gaston tells him a thing, that is to be 
taken for granted ; he cannot go behind it. (Cries of 
"No!" "No!") 

Well, now, Kellogg says to him — (A voice, "It's a 
lie!" Laughter and applause.) If there is any lawyer 
here that will dispute with me, I would like to have him.^ 

1 At various points, and presumably at this as one, Mr. Phillips turned 
around to the company on the platform, with a wave of the hand and a 



THE SPEECH OF MR. PHILLIPS. 19 

(Applause.) Now, then, Kellogg thus calls upon him, and 
Grant goes in September to Louisiana. The streets are 
running with blood. 

"At this point a burst of derisive laughter mingled 
with hisses greeted the speaker, and the uproar continued 
for nearly a minute, with cries of 'Oh!' 'Too thin!' 
groans, &c. Mr. Phillips endeavored in a deprecating 
way to stop the noise, and at last, being partly successful, 
resuming he said : " — 

Well, it is so. (Laughter.) Gentlemen, I did not say 
that. That is what the gentleman who sits over here, Mr. 
Salstonstall of Salem, said.^ (Laughter and applause, 
and cries of " No ! " " No ! ") And General Quincy said so.^ 
(Laughter.) He confessed that there was disorder enough 
in New Orleans to demand national interference. The 
United States troops went there, and, finding disorder, 
attempted to quell it. (Loud hisses and expressions of 
disgust.) 

Now, gentlemen, be patient. You are American citi- 
zens, and you have grave questions to discuss. When the 
Government, when the nation is called upon to send 
troops into a State by its constitutional authority, to quell 
domestic violence, when are those troops to go out ? I ask 
any constitutional lawyer to answer me, when are tliey to 
go out ? Why, they are to go out, gentlemen, when the 
domestic disturbance is quelled, not before. (Cries of 

swaying of the body which were ininiitahle grace, and were as much a part 
of the speech as the words he uttered, thus challenging a refdy: but to no 
one of these challenges had any of them all a mind to respond. This 
bearing and manner of his, and tlie silence of those challenged, greatly 
increased the effect of his words, making deeper the impression that there 
was no answer to be given. 

^ Hon. Leverett Salstonstall said : "To deny that the state of things 
is turbulent, that assassination is known there, as it is not here; that the 
perpetrators of wrong are not punished, (wohld be to deny) a well-known 
fact. . . . That disorder is not disputed." 

2 See what General Quincy said as cpioted in the Introduction. 



20 THE SPEECH OF MR. PHILLIPS. 

" That is so ! ") That is so exactly. (Applause.) Now, 
gentlemen, consider a moment; I will be very quick. 
(Cries of " Well, you 'd better ! " " Hurry up ! ') 

The next question is, Who is to decide that point ? 
(Voices, " John Brown ! " " The people ! " " The people ! ") 
Agreed. Whenever the Legislature assembles in that 
State and says to the National Government, " We are at 
peace; go out," why, out you go. When the Governor 
says to the national autliority, " We are done with you ; 
go," they are bound to go. (A voice, " They will never 
go ! ") In ordinary cases such would undoubtedly be the 
rule. 

But suppose — now hear me, gentlemen, these are grave 
questions — but suppose, gentlemen, that neither the Gov- 
ernor nor the Legislature makes any such affirmation, how 
is the President to know when to go ? He must exercise 
his own discretion. (Voices, " He don't know anything!" 
" He has nothing to do with it ! ") 

Yes, gentlemen, these are stern questions of constitu- 
tional law, and they must be met. (Cries of "Good!" 
" Good ! ") You do not want to send out of Faneuil Hall a 
series of resolutions that have no basis. (Voices, "Yes, 
they have ! " " You are right there ! ") I say, gentlemen, 
when the United States was once summoned into Louisiana 
constitutionally, and when neither the Governor nor the 
Legislature had given any voice as to whether they should 
o-o out or not, President Grant was bound to exercise his 
own discretion. He did so. (Cries of " No ! ") You can- 
not blame him for that. A Democratic president would 
be bound to do the same thing. He keeps his troops there. 
He says, " In my conscientious opinion (cries of " Oh, ho ! " 
" Oh, ho ! "), responsible to the United States under my 
oath of office, I do not think the emergency is ended. The 
transaction is not finished ; " and he keeps his troops 
there. 



THE SPEECH OF MR. PHILLIPS. 21 

The year breaks, the fourth day of January comes, the 
Legislature assembles, the clerk proceeds to call the roll. 
Listen to me, geutlemen ; here is the nub of the question. 
(Cries of "Go on ! " " Brave it through ! " &c.) The clerk 
proceeds to call the roll. It was his duty to do it. He 
was the only man in the State that could do it. Well, 
what takes place ? (Cries of " Put your coat on ! ") What 
takes place, gentlemen ? Mr. Schurz shall tell you. I 
will not quote any mean [* questionable] authority. Mr. 
Schurz shall tell you. He says : — 

"While the result was being announced, a motion was 
made by a member (Mr. Billieu), to appoint L. A. Wiltz 
temporary speaker. That motion was put and declared 
carried, — not, however, by the clerk (says Mr. Schurz, 
confessing the whole difficulty). Mr. Wiltz took possession 
of the chair," &c. (Voices, "Read the whole of that 
speech ! " " Nothing to do with it ! " Cries of " Good ! " 
" Good ! ") 

Now, gentlemen, I have studied this, — hear me. I 
assert that Mr. Schurz well knew the significance of that 
fact, which he did not conceah The motion was not put 
hy the clerk. Now I assert — and if there be a parlia- 
mentary lawyer in this house, I challenge contradiction 
(applause and cries of " Good! " " Good ! ") — the moment 
that any gentleman in that hall undertook to make a motion 
not addressed to the clerk, and to decide it when the clerk 
had not put it, or pronounced it carried, and when another 
gentleman, not the clerk, M-ent under that action and took 
the chair, that body ceased to be a legislature and became 
a mob. (Tremendous applause, hisses, cheers, and cries 
of "Good!" "Good!") "Dragged out five men from 
the Legislature of Louisiana." It was not the Louisiana 
Legislature, it was the New Orleans mob. (Tremendous 
applause and hisses.) 

What does General Sheridan say ? (Prolonged hisses, 



22 THE SPEECH OF MR. PHILLIPS. 

and cries of" Order ! " and " Hear him ! " " He lies ! " and an 
uproar so loud that the chairman had great difficulty in 
restoring order.) 

Is there any man here that feels himself authorized [or 
worthy] to write " liar " on the brow of General Sheridan ? 
(Cries of " No ! " " No I " and " Yes ! " " Yes ! ") Very well, 
then, listen to what General Sheridan says, recounting this 
event : — 

"Mr. Vigers had not finished announcing the result, when 
one of the members, Mr. Billieu of La Fourche, nominated 
Mr. Wiltz for temporary Speaker. Mr. Vigers promptly 
declared the motion out of order at that time ; when some 
one put the question, and amid cheers on the Democratic 
side of the House, Mr. Wiltz dashed onto the rostrum, 
pushed aside Mr. Vigers, seized the Speaker's chair and 
gavel, and declared himself Speaker. A protest against 
this arbitrary and unlawful proceeding was promptly made 
by members of the majority ; but Mr. Wiltz paid no 
attention to these protests." ^ 

Now, gentlemen, conservators of law and order (laugh- 
ter and applause), I will cite you a case in clear illus- 
tration of what I mean. It relates to Mr. John Quincy 
Adams, — not the one who spoke here, but, he will allow 

^ Foot-note by Mr. Phillips. 

The report of the Congressional Sub-Committee, since printed [in 
the same paper with the report of this meeting], and made evidently 
in the interest of the White League, confirms General Sheridan's state- 
ment. It says : — 

"On the first call of the roll, 102 members answered to their names. 
It is claimed by the Republicans, and we believe conceded by the Demo- 
crats, that 50 of those answering to their names were Democrats, and 52 
Republicans. The instant the clerk finished the roll-call, several members 
rose to their feet, but the floor was successfully held by Mr. Billieu, who 
said that he nominated L. A. Wiltz as temporary chairman. The clerk 
suggested that the legal motion was to elect a Speaker. Mr. Billieu him- 
self, paying no attention to the clerk, proceeded hurriedly to put his own 
motion, which was received by loud yeas and followed by loud nays, and 
declared it carried. Mr. Wiltz sprang instantly to the platform," &c. 



THE SPEECH OF MR. PHILLIPS. 23 

me to say, a much wiser man than himself. (Laughter 
and applause.) Well, gentlemen, in 1839 the National 
House of Eepresentatives at Washington could not 
organize. The clerk of t!ie House held the list in his 
hand, and he refused for three days to receive a motion. 
Three days he sat there ; no matter who adtlressed him he 
refused to receive a motion, and the National Government 
was checkmated. Any of you old enough will remember 
it, remember the impatience and disgust of the nation, 
under the disorder reigning at Washington. But there 
was not a man in the House of Eepresentatives that saw 
how it could be remedied. (A voice, " Where was Grant ?" 
Laughter.) Governor Wise, of Virginia, said once, " If I 
had the choice of John Quincy Adams's epitaph, I would 
write this on the tombstone, ' I will make the motion 
myself.' " 

The President. " Pat the motion." 

Mr. Phillips. Yes, " put the motion." What does he 
refer to ? How was it ? Why, on the fourth day, when 
the House stood checkmated, amazed, confounded, no man 
knowing how to get out of the difficulty, Adams rose and 
said : " I move that the clerk proceed to call the roll." 
The clerk refused. A stupefied Senator said to Mr. Adams, 
" How do you propose to have the motion put ? " There 
was not a man there who could conceive an outrage so 
gross as that in Louisiana : but Adams, tottering forward 
to the stand, said with sublime audacity, " I mean to put 
the motion myself." (Cries of " Good ! " " Good ! " and 
applause.) 

Now, gentlemen, what does that scene prove ? What 
does that three days acquiescence of the country, that 
three days waiting of the House of Representatives, that 
astonishment at the audacity of Adams when he was about 
to break the law, seeking its essence at the sacrifice of its 
form, prove ? Why, all that proves how inexorable the 



24 THE SPEECH OF MK. PHILLIPS. 

rigor of the parliamentary rule, that while the clerk is 
using decent manners, [* fitting despatch and behaving 
himself,] no man can put a motion in the House but 
himself. [* On any other theory the patience of tlie House 
was cowardly sloth ; Mr. Adams's long waiting was ignorant 
stupidity. But grant the iron rigor of this parliamentary 
rule, and the submission of the House is honorable obedi- 
ence to law, and Mr. Adams's final step rises to the level 
of sublime audacity. As when, in half a dozen great 
crises of history, some patriot statesman has " taken the 
responsibility " of breaking through the entanglements of 
law to save justice and the nation ; so Mr. Adams wrenched 
that legislative machine into running order. That National 
House of Eepresentatives waited three days before even 
Adams thought such law-breaking justifiable. This New 
Orleans mob did not allow the clerk to finish his an- 
nouncement of the results of tlie roll-call] Such being 
the case, the moment that gentleman, Mr. Wiltz, under 
that illegal motion, took the cliair — I challenge any legal 
gentleman here to answer me — that was a mob. (Cries 
of " Good ! " loud applause and hisses.) 

I have had occasion to study this question, Mr. Chair- 
man. We had a scene of that kind in this city in Decem- 
ber, 1860, when Mr. Murray Howe and Mr. Eichard Fay, 
acting exactly the same part in the drama that Mr. Wiltz 
did, entered Tremont Temple. They came forward, leaped 
upon the platform, and, brushing aside the proper authori- 
ties at a public meeting, said, " We will run this meeting," 
and Fay said, " I am chairman." That was a mob and 
nothing else. (Hisses.) Yes, that was a mob ; but no 
more so than this gathering in the New Orleans State 
House. 

Very well, what was left in Louisiana under the law ? 
The Legislature was fugitive from its own hall. A mob 
in the eye of the law — answer me if I am wrong (ap- 



THE SPEECH OF MR. PHILLIPS. 25 

plause, " You are wrong ! " and hisses) — was in possession of 
the State House. Tliere was nothing left of a government 
in Louisiana but Governor Kellogg. (Hisses.) Hiss if 
you please, but produce the master of j)arliaraentary law 
that will deny one of my propositions. (Loud applause.) 
[* The Senate had organized ; the House had not. It takes 
both to make a legislature. Consequently there was no 
Legislature for Kellogg to " convene."] What was left ? 
The Governor of the State was alone left ; and he said, 
as he was bound to say, to tiie United States troops who 
were then in charge of the peace of the State — they had 
gone there in September, and as the President had not seen 
fit to witlidraw them, they were lawfully there. My old 
fiiend, Henry Paine, if he were here, would not deny it, 
(" Good ! " and applause.) Very well, he sends for the 
soldiers, and says to them, " Turn that mob out of the 
State House." (Applause, cries of " Good ' " " Good ! " 
and hisses.) He had a right to say it, " Turn that mob 
out of the State House." ^ (A voice, " They could n't 
do it ! ") And I say to-day, — having for twenty years 
studied that very point of constitutional and parliaraen- 
tar}^ law, — I say that General De Trobriand and President 
Grant complied with every technical requisite of the con- 
stitutional law of the United States. (Tremendous and 
prolonged applause, and hisses.) 

That, gentlemen, is for the lawyers. That is for the men 
who undertake to say that, on the principles of the Consti- 

1 Foot-note by Mr. Phillips. 

It is objected to this view, that the Governor did, in fact, only order 
the removal of five illegal members. Granted. I only state his legal 
authority and position. He had a right to choose his own method of using 
that authority. He could either sweep the whole mob out of the State 
House, or only remove the most olijectionable part of it — in hopes that, 
perhaps, the Democratic White Loague members would then join with the 
men of order, and organize the House of Representatives. He had the 
full right to choose his method. 



26 THE SPEECH OF MR. PHILLIPS. 

tution, General Grant has overstepped his po^A'e^. (Cries 
of " He has ! " " He has ! ") I challenge any man with a legal 
reputation to deny my assertion (loud cries of "Evarts '" 
"Evarts!" from all parts of the hall) on the principles 
of parliamentary law. Mr. Evarts cannot change facts. 
Mr. Evarts, of course, has presented his personal views of 
this constitutional question. (A voice, " Ain't he a law- 
yer ? " ) Yes, he is a lawyer. (Cries, " And the best one 
in the country!") Yes, he is a good court lawyer; but I 
am not aware that he has the slightest claim to be con- 
sidered an authority in constitutional or parliamentary 
law. Mr. Adams is a lawyer ; Mr. Quincy is a lawyer ; 
they are all lawyers ; but I say not one single one of them 
has covered this point in the case, has he ? (Applause, 
and cries of " Yes, they have ! " " No, they have n't ! " and 
" Tell the truth, Wendell ! ") Did any one of them cover 
this point in the case ? ("Yes ! ") Which of them ? 

Now, gentlemen, I want to say one more word on the 
substance of the matter. (A great uproar. Cries of 
" Hear him ! " " Sit down ! " " Go on ! " " Cut it short ! " 
" Sit down ! " " Free speech ! " and applause and hisses.) The 
question whether President Grant (hisses) was justified 
in his action, whether in using his constitutional power 
with discretion, he used it wisely, honestly (cries of " Oh ! " 
" No !" "No! "and laughter), — that depends upon the state 
of affairs in Louisiana ; that depends on what, when he 
got to Louisiana under that constitutional call, he found 
there. (A voice, "He had no business there!") [*Did he 
find there the insubordination and " domestic violence," 
which Governor Kellogg alleged to exist ? What is the 
evidence ?] 

Now, gentlemen, the first speaker on this stand was our 
distinguished fellow-citizen. General Quincy. What did 
he say? He said he "left the live fire-brands and ashes 
of quarrel and turmoil and bloodshed when he left New 



THE SPEECH OF MR. PHILLIPS. 27 

Orleans." That is his testimony. (Voices, " He was n't 
there!" " He did not say so ! ") Well, General Sheridan 
was out there with him (a voice, " Tliat was in 1866 ! ") 
and saw these tire-brands; and now that same General 
Slieridan lias gone back there. (A voice, " After nine 
years ! ") Mr. Quincy resides in Boston ; and he says, 
although he " left fire-brands and hot ashes and discord in 
Louisiana, he does not believe there are any there to- 
day." ^ But General Sheridan, wjio has gone back there, 
says there are. Which will you believe ? (Shouts of 
" Sheridan ! " and yells. A voice, " We don't believe Sheri- 
dan ! " Applause.) Is not the man who has gone down 
and examined a better witness than the man who — stay- 
ing here, a thousand miles off — tells you he left that 
state of things, but thinks it is not there now ? (Great 
uproar, applause, and cries of " Sit down ! " " How about 
the Committee ? " " Oh, I am sick of you ! " " You have 
spoken long enough ! ") Will you give me quiet for a 
single moment ? (Cries of " Casey ! " " Packard ! ") ^ 

Men of Boston, I am not here to defend the adm'iuistra- 
tion. (Voices, " You are ! " " You are ! " " You are paid for 
it ! ") If these resolutions are passed — (Great uproar.) 
Men of Boston, men of Boston, if these resolutions are 
passed, they will carry consternation and terror into the 
house of every negro in Louisiana. (A voice, " W^e will 
pass them all ! " Applause, hisses, groans, laughter, cheers 
and cries, loud and long.) They will carry comfort to 

1 It is evident from tins that Mr. Pbillip.s did not catch the full pur- 
port of General Quincy's words, for he did saj' "that the smouldering 
embers . . . are still alive," and more to the same ettect, — his words 
entirely supporting jMr. Phillips' contention that the disorders in 
Louisiana warranted the keeping of the United States troops there. 
See the whole passage quoted in the Introduction. 

2 Casey was Collector of the Port of New Orleans, and Packard was 
rnited States Marshal for that district. Both were obno.xious to a large 
part of the people. 



28 THE SPEECH OF MR. PHILLIPS. 

every assassin (a voice, " Not a bit of it ! ") in New 
Orleans. (" Oh ! " and loud hisses and applause.) My 
anxiety is not for Washington. I don't care who is Presi- 
dent. My anxiety is for the hunted, tortured, robbed, 
murdered population, white and black, of the Southern 
States (a voice, " That 's played out ! ") whom you are go- 
ing to consign to the hands of their oppressors. (Hisses.) 
If you pass these resolutions — (Cries of "We will!" 
" We will ! ") If you pass these resolations — (Renewed 
cries of " We will ! " " We will ! ") If you pass these resolu- 
tions, gentlemen (loud cries of " We will ! " " We will : ") — 
I say it in the presence of God Almighty (cries of " Sh ! " 
" Sh ! " " Oh, ho ! " " Oh, ho ! " hisses antl voices, " He don't 
know you ! " " Whom you don't believe in ! ") — the blood 
of hundreds of blacks, and hundreds of whites, will be 
on your skirts before the first day of January next. (Loud 
laughter and hisses.) 

[*Look at the evidence. President Grant's message 
affirms that " lawlessness, turbulence, and bloodshed " 
cover the whole history of reconstructed Louisiana. If he 
is a selfish politician, it would be more profitable for him to 
paint it all peace, and so gain support of the now trium- 
phant white race. If he loves fame, to claim that he has 
really pacified the South would be the cap-sheaf of his 
glory. He has no temptation to exaggerate on the side of 
Louisiana disorder. General Sheridan, no partisan poli- 
tician — a new observer — confirms the President's state- 
ment. One speaker here ran a parallel between Boston in 
1770 and New Orleans now, quoting eloquent words of 
Samuel Adams. Well, Governor Warmouth, so-called, 
killed his man in the streets of New Orleans the other 
day. I don't remember that Samuel Adams or John 
Hancock engaged in any such freaks here in 1770, which 
shows, I think, rather a different atmosphere prevailing in 
the two cities. Democratic Congressmen tell us that in 



THE SPEECH OF MR. PHILLIPS. 29 

Alabama, where this same White League exists, no Eepub- 
licau member of Congress could safely show liis face. If 
the archives of this administration could be laid open, I 
believe the nation would be amazed to learn how often 
military power had been invoked in Southern States to 
save life and prevent outbreaks. I have myself had both 
letters and persons under my own roof enough to substan- 
tiate all the I'resident's charges. The very haste with which 
these White Leaguers sprang to work in that Legislative 
Hall, before any member could rightfully put a motion, 
shows conspiracy ; shows that they well knew they were 
in a minority ; and that only by tricks and violence could 
they manage to get possession of the form of a legislature, 
and overawe their opponents. Their illegal violence is 
confession tliat tiliey knew they had no legal means and 
no right to control the House if the law was strictly ob- 
served. The fact that Congress, after two years' effort, has 
been unable to fathom the bottomless muddle of Louis- 
iana politics, is proof of the " lawlessness and turbulence " 
which Grant charges. It shows clearly enougli, without 
further evidence, that the State can never be pacified 
without help from outside. 

One speaker here to-day urged Congress to order a new 
election in Louisiana. With all due submission to the 
opinions of those Congressmen who advocate that course, 
I emphatically deny its constitutionality. If Louisiana is 
a State, as is claimed, then Congress has no riglit to enter 
its limits by any such legislation. The only way, I affirm 
it most empliatically, the only way out of tliis confusion is 
for the Executive — acting under the authority which 
Kellogg's call, in September, gives it — to keep the peace 
of the State, no matter how long, until tlie orderly men 
of the State are able, nnder such protection, to establish 
good government there. I do not believe that any other 
Avay of bringing Louisiana into order is known to our sys- 



30 THE SPEECH OF ME. PHILLIPS. 

tein of government. Gentlemen may criticise and hold 
up tlieir hands in hypocritical horror ; learned Germans 
may come over as Senatorial missionaries to instruct us in 
our own business : but I defy any man to show any other 
constitutional method. I know all such military interfer- 
ence is dangerous. But the fault rests on those whose 
crimes make it necessary. Of course it is dangerous. So 
are all storms.] 

I know why I came here — (A voice, "You came to 
make a row !" Laughter, appl^iuse, and hissing.) My clients, 
my clients — Hisses, and so much confusion that tlie 
speaker could not be heard. The President stepped to his 
side and said, " Hear him, hear him ! Order, order, order !" 
(A voice cried, " Mesmerize him ! ") Mr. Phillips finally 
proceeded : — 

Gentlemen, you know perfectly well, every one of you, 
that this nation called four millions of negroes into citizen- 
ship to save itself. (Applause.) It never called them for 
their own sakes. It called them to save itself. (Cries of 
" Hear ! " " Hear ! ") And to-day, those resolutions, offered 
in Faneuil Hall, condemn the President of tlie United 
States (a voice, " Sit down ! "), and would take from him the 
power to protect the millions you have just lifted into 
danger. (Cries of " Played out '" " Sit down ! " &c.) You 
won't let him protect them. (Cries of " Xo ! ") What 
more contemptible object than a nation which, for its own 
selfish purpose, summons four millions of negroes to such 
a position of peril, and then leaves them defenceless ? 
AYhat more pitiable object than the President of such a 
nation, vested with full power to protect tliese hunted men 
(and you will not let him protect them), if he yield to this 
contemptible clamor, and leave them defenceless ? 

Well, gentlemen, I have done all I intended to do. I 
only wanted to record the protest of one citizen of Boston 
(uproarious applause) against that series of resolutions. 



THE SPEECH OF MR. PHILLIPS. 31 

(Hisses.) Other men recorded it by their absence, and by 
their refusal to sign that Call. (Renewed applause, and 
cries of " Question, please ! ") I chose to record mine in 
your presence, in this very hall and under this very roof 
where I have so often labored to bring these colored men 
into the very condition which makes them the object of 
the White League's fear and hatred, and constitutes their 
present danger. (Cries of "Yes, that's it !" and laughter.) 
I should deem myself wanting, in my duty as an old 
Abolitionist (loud hissing), and to the President of tlie 
United States (applause), if I did not utter every word 
in my power (cries of " Question !") against allowing a set 
of resolutions to go out from this hall that will make the 
negro and the white Kepublican more exposed to danger 
and more defenceless. 

" A great deal of noise and confusion here ensued, dur- 
ing which three cheers were given for Mr. Phillips." 

At once Col. Henry Lee, who had read the resolutions, 
came to the front and spoke briefly, practically conceding 
the correctness of Mr. Phillips's criticism, that the meet- 
ing was not called by Boston, by allowing that the Call 
might have read, " Boston and vicinity." 

Then a resolution was introduced praising the adminis- 
tration, and thus neutralizing tlie resolutions already read. 

Tlien a man came forward from the floor who was so 
unknown that the President of the meeting liad to ask 
him his name, and poured out a bitter diatribe against 
Mr. Phillip,^. 

Tlien the resolution of praise of tlie President of tlie 
United States was declared voted down, though a multi- 
tude voted for it ; and the resolutions of censure were de- 
clared sustained, though a multitude voted against them, 
and the meeting immediately dissolved. 

My neighbor, the judge, insists that the vote against the 



32 THE SPEECH OF MR. PHILLIPS. 

resolutions was manifestly heavier than that for them ; 
" though of course," he added, " the President had to 
declare them carried, as that was what the meeting was 
for." Also my other neighbor who was present supports 
the judge's statement. Moreover, in Austin's Life of 
Phillips the same position is taken. 

The conduct of one person in this affair merits high 
commendation. The President of the meeting, Hon. 
William Gray, showed himself fully deserving of the 
title which designates him as a nobleman. Placed in a 
position of great difficulty, he exhibited the traits of a 
true gentleman, a courageous presiding officer, a genuine 
hero. Though his sympathies were with the promoters 
of the meeting, yet he rose above the partisan, and became 
the ideal presiding officer, — the man of fair mind and the 
steadfast purpose that even an opponent should have his 
just right. So with admirable faithfulness, clear through 
to the end, he repeatedly exercised all his force, and with 
measurable success, to secure for Mr. Phillips the opportun- 
ity to present his views. Hence, I utter the higliest word 
that can be spoken in liis honor, when I say, He was worthy 
of Faneuil Hall. As the speech of Mr. Phillips was the 
only utterance on that occasion having the pith of great 
value in it which makes it worthy of remembrance, so the 
action of Mr. Gray as President, in extending to Mr. Phil- 
lips the opportunity to speak, and in steadfastly maintain- 
ing it with strenuous energy to the very end, well deserves 
to be cherished in memory while the speech itself shall 
continue to be read. 



EDITORIAL REMARKS ON THE OCCASION. 

\^ /"E believe that to all persons who shall ever care 
V > for Mr. Phillips, the following quotations from 
the Boston press of the next day will be specially inter- 
esting. 

The opening portion of the editorial leader in the " Ad- 
vertiser " for the next morning was as follows : — 

" Not since the war times, certainly, have the walls of Faiieuil 
Hall contained such a meeting as that of yesterday. From noon 
until the adjournment, at a quarter past three, it was filled with a 
profoundly interested and sometimes intensely excited audience, 
standing full close for comfort. The places of those whom 
business called away before the conclusion were taken by others 
coming in, and when the question on the resolutions was put, 
the galleries were still full, and the large area of the floor was 
crowded from the speaker's stand to the door." 

In the introduction to the "Advertiser's" report of the 
meeting occurred the following paragraphs : — 

" The meeting in Faneuil Hall at noon yesterday, called to 
* protest against the late military interference with the organ- 
ization of the Legislature of Louisiana,' was the occasion of a 
demonstration such as has not been seen in that historic edifice 
since the war. . . . Althougli the day was cold, and the hall so 
chilly that none could be comfortable without an overcoat, there 
was a large attendance. At noon tlie hall was comfortably 
filled, and when the meeting was called to order, ten minutes 
later, there was no standing room left. Wendell Phillips was 
then sitting on (It was behind. Ed.) the railing of the left- 
hand gallery, at the upper end of the hall, in full view of and 
facing the audience." 

3 



34 EDITOKIAL REMARKS ON THE OCCASION. 

" He (Phillips) descended to the platform and delivered a 
half-hour's speech. . . . He was continuallj^ interrupted by 
noisy demonstrations, and was many times obliged for several 
moments to cease speaking. One was forcibly reminded of the 
scenes that occurred in tlie old time war meetings, amid which 
the same now veteran orator stood cool and undismayed. He 
displayed not the slightest impatience or displeasure, but 
calmly and determinedly vvaited till tlie excited audience had 
uttered its roars, and tlien quietly proceeded with his remarks. 
He was followed by Mr. Henry Lee in a few quiet and pleasant 
remarks." 

The " Post's " leader uext morning contained the fol- 
lowing : — 

" In tlie surging crowd in and about Faneuil Hall there 
was yesterday seen significant proof of the intense interest with 
which the citizens of Boston regard the Jjouisiana usurpation. 
The meeting was large and representative, both on the plat- 
form and on the floor, and notably free, so far as the announced 
purpose of the assembly was concerned, from any factional 
spirit. Republicans and Democrats met only as citizens to 
protest against a common wrong, and a distinguishing feature 
of the occasion was the earnestness with which gentlemen promi- 
nently identified with the former party used their voice and 
influence in condemnation of Executive tyranny in Louisiana: 

" The generosity which accorded Mr. Phillips a hearing in 
response to the call made upon him, was not disappointed 
in the result. His invective lacked nerve and logic. He de- 
scended to petty quibbles and personalities, and was sufficiently 
answered by the contrast of the other speeches." 

From the Introduction by the "Post" to its report of 
the meeting : — 

"One of the most remarkable meetings held in this city for a 
generation was that which convened in Faneuil Hall at noon 
yesterday in response to a call for an assemblage of citizens, 



EDITORIAL REMARKS ON THE OCCASION. 35 

irrespective of party, who wished to protest against tlie recent 
interference of the aiilitary of the United States with the Legis- 
lature of Louisiana. . . . 

"Wendell Pliillips, from the commencement of the proceed- 
ings, occupied a conspicuous seat in the front row of the left 
gallery near the platform, and when the address of Mr. Adams 
had been completed, calls were made for him from the floor. 
He did nothing more then than to smile a response. But when 
his name had been called at intervals during the next hour, and 
when, at the conclusion of the address of Mr. JVIorse, the chair- 
man invited any one in the audience to speak, Mr. Phillips arose 
in his place, and, accepting a request to take the platform, spoke 
for a few minutes. The speaker's manner was not on this occa- 
sion bland and smooth as when facing a lyceum audience, nor 
did his words flow with the measured, studied emphasis whicli 
most hearers have admired in him. On the contrary, his sen- 
tences were uneven, his delivery was somewhat excited, and 
there was that in his face and voice which showed that the 
mingled liisses, questions, and other interruptions which came 
from a part of the audience, and the evident disapproval with 
which his words were received by many others, was by no 
means pleasant to contemplate. When he had taken his seat, 
and wlien the cutting replies of Colonel Lee and Mr. Hamilton 
had caused the old hall to echo with round after round of 
applause, Mr. Plyllips's discomfiture was still more painfully 
manifest." 

The "Traveller" had the following as a part of its edi- 
torial on the occasion : — 

" Tlie speech of Wendell Phillips, made at a late hour, and 
amid rude interruptions, completely answered some of the 
boldest assertions and most jdausible arguments of the regular 
speakers, satisfying all tliinking and reasonable men tliat the 
liberties of the people of Louisiana were made secure rather 
than endangered by the acts this meeting was nominally called 
to condemn." 



36 EDITORIAL REMARKS ON THE OCCASION. 

The " Transcript " was so impressed with the pith and 
force and pertinence of the speech, that, ahnost apologizing 
for the fraguientariness of its Friday afternoon account, it 
gave a full, verbatim report of it on Saturday, as much as 
to say, " This was the speech of that occasion, and uttered 
the true word that was required." Also, as showing where 
it stood and with emphasis, it gave a column editorial 
against the positions of the meeting, with arguments which 
are unanswerable. One can hardly help thinking that 
every one of those who promoted it must have slept that 
Saturday night on a pillow of thorns. 

The " Index," a weekly paper, in its next issue, Jan- 
uary 21, in a signed editorial, said : — 

"Through the voice of Wendell Phillips, a voice always heard 
on the side of true liberty, the real sentiments of Boston found 
expression. Point by point Mr. Pliillips followed out the argu- 
ment, repeatedly calling on the White League lawyers to con- 
trovert him. Silently they deserted the platform ; and when 
at lengtli the orator had finished, the gentleman who had offered 
the resolutions declared to the audience, ' I feel like saying, " God 
be merciful to me a sinner." ' A jest if you please, but none 
the less an inspiration. Faneuil Hall was redeemed ; the good 
name of the city was saved from dishonor ; and the organization 
of a permanent Boston White League was indefinitely postponed. 

" ElCHARD P. HaLLOWELL." 



THE PRINCIPLES INVOLVED IN THE CASE. 

THE action of the three great meetings in Boston, New 
York, and St. Louis was all based upon two assump- 
tions : the first, that the Assembly was legally organized by 
the so-called election of Mr. Wiltz ; and the second, that 
the United States troops went into the Assembly and took 
out the five men by military authority, of military initi- 
ative and decision. Mr. Phillips demonstrated the falsity 
of both these assumptions. 

First, he demonstrated that the Assembly was not organ- 
ized, by showing that the putting of the motion by Mr. 
Billieu was wholly illegal, which made it and all the pro- 
ceedings under it null and void. A brief examination will 
show just why it was null and void. 

In a parlimentary government there are certain forms 
established by law through which the personality of the 
administration is renewed. By these forms it is required 
that those in office shall lawfully transfer in due form the 
authority and power of the government to those who have 
been lawfully elected to receive them. This lawful trans- 
ference was the matter at issue in New Orleans in the case 
of the Assembly, or Lower House of the Legislature. 

Now it is a vital principle of parliamentary procedure 
that the government already existing must have charge of 
the formation of the new body, as the only way by which 
that body, in the very act of forming, may be taken up into 
and Ijecome a constituent part of the government, ami so 
the continuity of the government be preserved. This is in 
the nature of the case. To this end it is vital that the 
government should be present in the person of its lawfully 



38 THE PRINCIPLES INVOLVED IN THE CASE. 

appointed officer, aud have full charge of the proceedings. 
In the case of the Assembly, that officer is the clerk, who, 
as lawfully appointed and sworn, is the embodiment of the 
government, present and in charge. The clerk is the living 
link of union through which the new Assembly that is 
about to be constituted, in the very act of beiug consti- 
tuted, will be joined into the government already existent, 
receive of its life, and become a part of it. 

Such being the representative character aud function of 
the clerk, and those who have the right to become members 
of the Assembly being convened according to law, the fol- 
lowing are his duties : — 

First, he is to call the meeting to order, which being 
sained, he is forthwith to call the roll. Tlie roll is the 
official list, made under law, of those persons who have 
been legally certified to as having been elected to become 
members of the new body. Without the list, it cannot be 
known who have the right to become members. Hence 
no persons but those whose names are on the roll can take 
part in the formation of the body, because the list is the 
legal title to a place there. Even if by error, or fraud and 
wrong, names are there which ought not to be, or are not 
there which ought to be, still for that occasion the roll is 
final. All questions of error or wrong must be settled at 
another time. 

As the clerk calls the roll, the persons must answer to 
their names, to show who of the lawfully elected persons 
are present. 

Next, a majority of those whose names are on the roll 
must be present to constitute a quorum ; the clerk must so 
declare, and then must "await any motion." In some 
States the members are sworn in at tliis point; but in 
Louisiana the next step is to affect a temporary organi- 
zation. 

The only motion now in order is concerning a presiding 



THE PRINCIPLES INVOLVED IN THE CASE. 39 

officer. Should one candidate be named, or more than 
one, in any event the clerk puts the motion. By whatever 
method the result is to be arrived at, the clerk must put the 
motion for the reasons already given : for when the clerk, 
as the officer lawfully appointed, puts the motion, and 
action is taken under the motion by which a person is 
elected, and the clerk declares the pei'son elected, in 
making that declaration the clerk officially imparts to the 
body the legal breath of life and forms the organization. 
The person so elected becomes the lawful presiding officer 
to whom the clerk must turn over the gavel, as the sign 
and instrument of authority, and the power of the clerk 
then ceases, while up to that time it has been vital and 
paramount. Kow all this is in the nature of the case, and 
is essential to parliamentary government. ]\Ioreover, it has 
all been wrought out through centuries of struggle, in storm 
and stress and multitudinous experience, by the English- 
speaking peoples, and is a heritage of inestimable value, to 
be strenuously preserved. This heritage the action of the 
Wiltz part of the Louisiana Legislature wholly tended to 
destroy. 

The principles involved will be more evident if we 
examine the case in question. The act of Mr. Billieu in 
putting his own motion was void (as it would have been to 
put any motion), because he was, as yet, only a private citi- 
zen, having no official position at all, though having the 
legal right to come into an official position, and hence, by 
the absence of official life in himself, being incaj^able of 
imparting such life to others. For, as it has been heretofore 
shown, in the nature of the case, only as the lawfully 
appointed and sworn officer, in whom the governmental 
life was present so that he was the embodied government, 
put the motion and made the official declaration that the 
motion was carried, and the certain person elected, could 
the governmental life pass to the one elected and to those 



40 THE PEINCIPLES INVOLVED IN THE CASE. 

who elected liim, so that they, as an organized body, could 
enter into union with the government as an organic part 
of it. The breath of official declaration is the breath of 
legal life to the body, which can only come from the one 
who lias that life, namely, in the Assembly, the lawfully 
appointed officer, the clerk. Mr. Billieu, not being such 
officer, nor any official at all as yet, but only a private 
citizen, did not have, and could not have, any breath of 
legal life in himself, and so could not impart any to the 
body. This fact made his act, in putting his own motion 
and declaring it carried, a mere idle breath, a legal noth- 
ing, an act altogether null and void. And hence all that 
was done afterwards under his act was equally null and 
void. Hence Mr. Wiltz was not chairman ; there was no 
chairman ; there was no organization ; there was only chaos, 
with a chaos mind on the part of those who made the 
chaos, that could not know itself, —7 a chaos mind in a 
delirium, fancying itself to be in order. 

In this plain view of the case it is hard to see how so 
able a man as the recent Mr. John Quincy Adams could 
have taken the position he did, even under the flooding 
influence of political passion. He said, " Even if the pre- 
vailing faction pressed to the very edge of the law, yet 
they respected the law." How could he say this, wlien 
their action was utterly lawless, as we have just pointed 
out in detail, having no law for it, but being against the 
nature of the case and every element of law involved in 
it ? And this remark covers the ground of all the speakers 
and all the meetings. 

Second, Mr. Phillips demonstrated that the other assump- 
tion had no foundation in fact, but " that General De 
Trobriand and President Grant complied with every tech- 
nical requisite of the constitutional law of the United 
States." There is additional evidence, which he did not 
quote, which no one will question. It is the testimony 



THE PEINCIPLES INVOLVED IN THE CASE. 41 

of Mr. Wiltz himself, in his report to the Federal Goveru- 
meut, made in his own behalf, concerning the events of 
that January fourth. Describing wliat took place when 
the five men were arrested and taken away, he gives the 
following : — 

Wiltz. " Are these members (the five) to be ejected ? " 

Genekal De Tkobkiand. " I am but a soldier. There 
are my orders. I cannot enter into a consideration of 
that question." 

" The General further stated that he was under instruc- 
tions to obey the orders of Governor Kellogg." 

Such testimony is conclusive, and leaves nothing more 
to be needed. The military were the police force of Gov- 
ernor Kellogg, under his orders and doing his bidding ; 
the civil authority was paramount and directive, and not 
a phrase of the constitutional law of the United States 
was violated by their presence and action. 

In view of this state of the case, what becomes of 
the fierce cry, " What right had soldiers of the United 
States to determine who should sit in the Legislature of a 
State ? " The}'' did not determine. The Governor, the 
civil authority, determined, and nobody else did. All that 
the soldiers did was to obey the orders received from their 
lawful, civil superior. Moreover, what they were used for 
was to keep the peace. The arrest of the five men was 
an act of keeping the pjeace, because every step in the 
movement to seat them had been a breach of the peace. 

The confused state of mind of many excellent citizens 
on tills whole matter, and the complete error into which 
they fell, is illustrated by the contradiction which General 
Quincy made in two parts of his speech. He first said : 

" It was never pretended that previous instructions from 
the White House directed the expulsion from the Legisla- 
ture of such persons claiming to be meinbers as Governor 
Kellogg should designate," — thus conceding that it was 



42 THE PRINCIPLES INVOLVED IN THE CASE. 

be who did designate those who were to be removed. But 
after a little General Quincy said : — 

" For when he (President Grant) tells us that no person 
was ejected who had a right to a seat, be simply indorses 
the decision of General De Trobriand's bayonets. Whether 
the decision of the bayonet was in accordance with the 
facts or not nobody cares. The crime was the assumption 
of jurisdiction." Now as General Quincy had just before 
allowed that it was Governor Kellogg who had decided and 
designated who were to be expelled, by his own showing 
the "decision" was not made by " General De Trobriand's 
bayonets ; " and when he alleges that it was they who did so 
decide and designate, he contradicts his own words spoken 
just before. But he also contradicts the plain and indu- 
bitable facts in the case : for all the testimony shows that 
the whole position and action of the troops in this affair 
were those of a police force acting under the direction of 
tbeir superior civil officer, the Governor of the State, 
Kellogg. Also, there was no " assumption of jurisdiction" 
on the part of the troops or any military officer. The 
whole "assumption of jurisdiction" was by the Governor, 
and the troops simply acted in obedience to his orders, as 
General De Trobriand declared in terras to Mr. Wiltz, and 
the Litter impliedly allowed. 

At this point it may very properly be asked, In view of 
the above argument, how can the action of ex -President 
Adams be legally justified ? 

For answer, it should first be said that his action was 
" law-breaking," as Mr. Pliillips explicitly declared. 

But it should next be said, and at once, that it was a 
right " law-breaking," because it was an action according 
to another law, which it was fit not only but also a duty 
to act under, in order to meet an exigency which must be 
met, and for which no statute had made provision. For 
the law could not imagine that such an officer as tlie clerk 



THE PRINCIPLES INVOLVED IN THE CASE. 43 

could be so false to liis trust as to refuse to do his sworn 
duty. But when such an exigency had arisen, then the 
preservation of government not only permitted but required 
a reverting to the first principles of primary action in the 
organization of democratic society. We have all, doubtless, 
from childhood up, been familiar with instances of this 
primary action, when it happened something as follows : 

The citizens being gathered for some purpose which re- 
quired organization, and there was none, one of the elder 
and more influential of those present would rise and call 
the meeting to order. Then hats would come off, the buz- 
zing sound of conversation would cease, and all would be 
in order at once. Then this elder citizen would move that 
So-and-so, naming a citizen, be chairman of the meeting ; 
the motion would be seconded ; the mover would put his 
own motion ; it would be voted ; and he would declare it 
carried. Then he would invite the one elected to come 
forward and take the chair ; he would do so ; and the 
meeting thus passed from chaos to organized order. Now 
it was to this principle of primary organization, which is 
simplicity itself, and with which Mr. Adams must have 
been familiar from childhood, that he reverted when he 
said, " I mean to put the motion myself." He was by far 
the oldest and most eminent person among those elected 
as members of the House ; his action organized them 
according to the way of primitive simplicity ; and all the 
other departments of the government accepting the action, 
imparted to it official sanction and life, and joined it in 
with the government as a part of itself. But nothing ex- 
cept an otherwise insurmountable exigency made his course 
allowable. Yet that exigency, becoming fully manifested, 
did make his " law-breaking " course not only allowable, 
but a lawful necessity. Thus did Mr. Adams break the 
law to preserve the government, "seeking its essence at 
the sacrifice of its form," just as Mr. Phillips said. 



44 THE PEINCIPLES INVOLVED IN THE CASE. 

But there was nothing of this sort at New Orleans, and 
those, like Colonel Cod man, who quoted the action of Mr. 
Adams, to justify the Wiltz faction, did so at the expense 
of their soundness of mind. Every form of the law was 
being scrupulously observed, the clerk was in the very act 
of performing his full duty, the Wiltz faction of fifty were 
having every legal right which the Eepublican faction of 
fifty-two were having. So far as action in that hall con- 
cerning organization was concerned (and nothing else could 
be lawfully considered there at that time), everything was 
being done strictly according to law and in order. Such 
being the case, the Wiltz faction had no more right to do 
what they did do, than they had a right to organize an 
armed band and come by violence, vi vt armis, as the law 
phrase is, and drive out the others and establish themselves 
instead. Hence that faction were wholly law-breakers in 
what they did ; their law-breaking was altogether null and 
void ; their organization was a legal nothing ; and they were 
a " New Orleans mob," just as Mr. Phillips said. And it 
was the null-and-void action of this mob that the citizens 
of Boston were called togetlier to defend in that meeting 
in Faneuil Hall, and which those eminent citizens who 
promoted the meeting did defend as if it were lawful and 
right, — earnestly thinking it was so, when it was alto- 
gether not so, so deluded may the mind of man become 
when befogged by partisan views of the condition of 
affairs. 

In view of the above considerations, the contention of 
Mr. Phillips is fully sustained on both points. He swept 
out from under the feet of the meeting every particle of 
foundation on which the promoters of it had [based their 
action. His warning words, " You do net want to send out 
of Faneuil Hall a series of resolutions that have no basis," 
were ominous of tlie reality. The resolutions which were 
sent out had no " basis " in fact. The whole view of those 



THE PRINCIPLES INVOLVED IN THE CASE. 45 

who supported them was a phantom in air, and the moun- 
tains of their rhetoric were only clouds. That so many 
able men could be so misled as to believe that the " unsub- 
stantial fabric of a vision" of complete error in tlieir im- 
aginations was solid substance, only shows how the pas- 
sions and prejudices of men can flood their minds with 
false views and mislead their judgments. Mr. Phillips 
never has been answered. An answer never has been 
attempted. Col. Henry Lee, speaking right after him, said, 
" Nobody proposes to answer him ; in fact he is generally 
unanswerable ; " and even if the words were spoken in 
sarcasm, they were none the less soberly and wholly true. 

There is evidence that the people of the country began 
to find out the real state of tlie case even before the Fan- 
euil Hall meeting was held. On the morning of that day 
when it was held, there appeared in the " Boston Herald," 
under the title of " Men and Things," an item which shows 
this. It was as follows : — 

" There is an impression among the white conservatives of 
Louisiana that the plan for seizing upon the organization of the 
House hy WiUz and his companions was ill advised and badly 
managed. The irregularity of their proceedings is the thing 
that befogs the question of military interference more than 
anything else." 

This virtually gives away the whole case, concedes all 
that ]\Ir. riiillips claimed, atul allows that there was no 
ground for the meeting. Whence it follows that those 
eager orators who voiced the meeting were very earnest 
about somethiucT that was not so. 



CRITICAL ESTIMATE, 

THE career of Weudell Phillips as a reformer began in 
Faneuil Hall with a battle, and thirty-seven years 
afterwards closed in Faneuil Hall with a battle ; and the 
object of both battles, and of all the long years of struggle 
between, was freedom, — especially for the negro, but also, 
and all the while, freedom and uplift for all mankind. 
That the speech given herewith closed his work as a 
reformer, as distinctly as the Lovejoy speech opened it, a 
survey of his career seems to make plain. Literally, it 
was his last battle, and, literally, it was one of his greatest 
victories, in some aspects it may have been his very great- 
est : for it was more than a mere battle of will and a 
victory of power ; it was a great forensic argument on a 
vital question of parliamentary law, affecting the founda- 
tions of government, in which he stood alone, wholly 
right, and settled the case in this nation for all coming 
time. 

On this occasion all his powers seemed to move at their 
highest bent. That massive presence, that dauntless cour- 
age, that immeasurable vigor, that lofty resolution, that 
energy and effectiveness of action were all of such degree 
that he never appeared more colossal and masterful than 
he did there, as he breasted the waves of that storm-tossed 
assemblage, and dashed them all aside. Well sj)oke they 
the right word to his heart who cried out to him from the 
assembly, " Go on ! " " Brave it through ! " I hear the 
words even now sounding down from that far away 
time, '•' Brave it through ! " That was he, Great Heart, 
that was he, " Brave it through ! " Ay, ay, and he did ; 



CRITICAL ESTIMATE. 47 

he did not fail, lie did not quail, he did not turn aside. 
Dauntless and strong and right, he braved it through, and 
triumphed over all. When he arose to speak, the meeting 
was chiefly with the promoters, though many were with 
him. When he finished, he had turned the meeting upside 
down ; he had mastered the greater part of that vast con- 
course of people, and they undoubtedly voted with him, 
instead of with the rest of the speakers. 

It is only by contemplating such a mighty manifestation 
of power on the part of Mr. Phillips, in which his stature 
is measured against the background of such a crowd, that 
one can gain an adequate sense of the immensity of the 
personality of this greatest of American orators. The 
effect which he produced was sententiously summed up 
by the doctor in the brief saying, " He killed the meet- 
ing." The vote, as it was really given, showed that he had. 
And as it appeared to this on-looker, so it appears to one 
looking back over what happened. " He killed the meet- 
ing ; " and Boston knew it before nightfall of that Saturday 
after. 

But hardly, if any, less than the energy of his action 
was the penetration, clear-sight, and right-sight of his 
mind. His eye pierced to the very pith and substance of 
the case. He saw accurately the " nub of the question," 
to use his own phrase ; he discerned the whole reality of 
the matter just as it was ; and he set it forth in white 
noon-light, and in such correct array as left no answer 
possible. 

The message of the President, with all the help of his 
advisers, was not equal to Mr. Phillips's statement. Not 
one of the speakers at the meeting covered the vital point, 
lawyers though they were ; and throughout the land there 
appeared to be but one journal, at least of national scope, 
that had discerned it. A foremost Democratic paper of 
Chicago had boldly said that the Wiltz faction was the 



48 CKITICAL ESTIMATE. 

one which appeared to be the party of violence and law- 
breaking. So Mr. Phillips stood, on that chill, winter 
afternoon, almost as much alone in the land as he stood 
alone amid the crowds in Faneuil Hall, seeing the right 
exactly, declaring that right to the full boldly, amid " such 
contradiction of sinners against himself," and so illuminat- 
ing the whole situation. 

For more than three hours on that winter day, the 
people stood a solid throng, filling Faneuil Hall full, and 
listening as speaker after speaker poured forth such 
thought as he had on a great, national question. But all 
the rest were merely the opportunity and setting for this 
one speech, — all the rest were cross-eyed misapprehen- 
sion, twisted error, empty fancy, idle breath, combined 
into an event so that one voice might speak worthily the 
true word which should give light to every one who desired 
to see the way. Except for that word, — this speech of 
Wendell Phillips, — that occasion would have fallen into 
utter oblivion ; but now it will ever be a live, historic 
fact, because in it there came that magnificent manifesta- 
tion of his power in the utterance of the tj-ue and needed 
word which he spoke. 

During a call on Senator Henry Wilson, many years ago, 
Wendell Phillips was spoken of, and the Senator told 
the following anecdote: — 

" I was talking," he said, " with a gentleman in Boston, 
and the question arose, ' Why does not Mr. Phillips, at 
least once a year, prepare a thorough, well-ordered law 
argument on some great question of society, and present 
it to the public, the same as Cliarles Sumner does ? ' The 
reply was that he was not able to construct such an 
argument." 

The speech we are considering is the refutation of that 
view. Not worked out like hammered gold by the light 
of the midnight lamp, but struck out all at once in the 



CRITICAL ESTIMATE. 49 

heat of a tremendous struggle, it is a great law argument 
on a fundamental question of parliamentary procedure in 
the conduct of our National Government, in which Mr. 
Phillips set forth the true principles involved in the case 
in right and orderly array, and so established just judgment 
clearly, accurately, completely, masterfully. He was not 
indeed a Senator of the nation, but he was the Tribune of 
the nation ; and the question in hand was one of the 
nation's life and conduct of affairs, which he altogether 
adequately met. Hence one may truly say that in the 
importance of the occasion and tlie greatness of the power 
and lucidity of expression with which the principles in- 
volved were presented, this address, as a forensic utterance, 
deserves to be compared with Webster's reply to Hayne. 
It annihilated the opposite side in a struggle on a great 
national question of constitutional law, just as Webster's 
reply did. 

That the career of Wendell Phillips as a reformer should 
have opened in a battle in the "Cradle of Liberty," and 
more than a generation after should have closed in a battle 
where it opened, came not by any planning of the mind and 
will of man, but came in the purpose and ordering of that 
higher Power who guides the stars in their courses in the 
sky, and the ways of men in their courses on the earth. 
And it was an ideal rounding of that grand career, leaving 
nothing in the field of reform that the heart to which he 
was dearest could ask for more. 



REV. JESSE H.JONES, HON. J. Q. A. BRACKETT, JOHN LATHAM, 

PRESIDENT. TREASURER. FINANCIAL SECRETARY. 



IBcnticll JBljillip^ St^cmorial ^t^^ociation, 

159 BEACH STREET, BOSTON, MASS. 



" I ^HE attention of the reader is invited to the work of 
-*- the Wendell Phillips Memorial Association. 

This Association exists to honor the name and com- 
memorate the services of Wendell Phillips. To this end 
it has founded two memorial, oratorical scholarships 
bearing his name, one in Harvard and the other in Tufts 
College. Each is " to be awarded to one about to become 
a Junior, who has special oratorical powers, and gives 
promise of becoming a real force as a public speaker." 
The one at Harvard amounts to more than $1,300, and 
that in Tufts to $1,400. We desire to raise each of them 
to $5,000, which is the standard amount for a scholar- 
ship, and provides to the beneficiary $200 a year. Such 
as they are, both of them are now available. Are you, 
reader, willing to aid in completing either of these scholar- 
ships ? Correspondence solicited. 

The proceeds from the sale of this pamphlet go toM'ard 
completing these scholarships : price 25 cts. For sale by 
Lee and Shepard, 10 Milk Street, or 

Jesse H. Jones, 

159 Beach Street, 2d floor, 

Boston, Mass. 



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